New Jersey law enforcement officials are combing through data released by NJ Advance Media on police use of force to improve training and potentially root out overly aggressive police officers, the state’s top cop told lawmakers this week.

Now the state is overhauling how it tracks police use of force, but it remains unclear whether authorities plan to make public the same data The Force Report compiled through public records requests. Under questioning from lawmakers, Grewal would commit only to making “certain parts” of the oversight system public.

The attorney general said the NJ Advance Media investigation “obviously highlighted shortcomings in the way we track use of force in the state” and that state officials were in the process of creating uniform reporting requirements that will allow “apples to apples comparisons across the state.”

Despite existing guidelines detailing how departments should be recording use of force, the attorney general said, “what we saw in the Star-Ledger reporting was that some departments reported every time an officer touched an individual they arrested, and in other cases departments did not report the use of force to overcome minimal resistance."

"So we wanted to come up with guidelines for reporting so that it’s uniform,” he said.

Previously, state authorities said they expected to finish the overhaul by the end of 2019, but Grewal said Tuesday that it would likely take another year.

In the meantime, he said, “We are also acting on the information from the use-of-force report that The Star-Ledger put out."

Grewal said his office purchased the data from NJ Advance Media, which spent more than $30,000 compiling it from 72,000 paper records. The data was made available for sale through ProPublica, a nonprofit, investigative news organization, for $2,000 to academic institutions and government agencies.

The Office of Law Enforcement Professional Standards, an oversight body within the Attorney General’s Office, is conducting its own analysis. Grewal said the office was collecting new data for 2017 and 2018, which was not included in The Force Report because it was not available at the time.

Grewal said the state had implemented a number of reforms in recent years, including cultural sensitivity and implicit bias training for cops.

“It’s my hope that when we look at the ’17 and ’18 data, that we’ll see similar trends that continues to go down and the disparities are addressed,” he said.

NJ Advance Media’s investigation revealed multiple officers who were charged with brutalizing suspects and other types of misconduct who would have raised red flags under early warning systems tracking how frequently officers use force.

The inquiry also highlighted the daily dangers police face, finding more than 6,500 officers who reported suffering injuries while arresting suspects over the five years analyzed, or about 3.5 times every day statewide.

It’s unclear what actions Grewal’s office will take regarding departments with disproportionately high force rates. As the state’s top law enforcement official, the attorney general has the power to issue directives, install monitors at individual departments or prosecutor’s offices and demand other changes.

“If that information can be used to improve conduct, we’ll do that, and if it can be used for accountability, we’ll do that,” Grewal told lawmakers.

The Force Report was launched following a state Supreme Court ruling that found the brief reports filled out by police any time they use force against a suspect were public records. The information contained in the reports includes the names of officers and suspects, as well as demographic data, including age, gender, race and ethnicity.

“I do anticipate, for transparency and accountability purposes, that we will be making certain parts of this data public when we put together this system, because I think that helps promote trust between law enforcement and the community,” he said.

Sen. Declan O’Scanlon, R-Monmouth, lauded the attorney general’s efforts to track use of force, noting The Force Report found that the majority of police officers in the state barely used force at all. The senator said better oversight improves public trust, but added that "when we focus on these things, we tend to — inadvertently, I think — cast a pall on policing and police officers in general.”

“We have to focus on cops that are bad, but we need to give a shout-out, frequently, to the overwhelming majority that are good guys," he said.